The bow could be seen without night glasses now, an enormous axeblade of steel with a foaming bow wave at its cutwater, towering over the side of the frigate. Someone on the frigate’s bridge was yanking frantically on the lever of the ship’s siren. The Fatahillah herself was screaming in terror.
And in response, the bow of the onrushing ship was turning as well.
Turning in …
Towards them!
*
Amanda keyed the I-MC circuit. “All hands, brace for impact! Hang on!”
She had been involved in an accidental collision at sea before – but never a deliberate one. She felt an arm close around her waist as Harconan got a grip on both her and the chart table. Then steel impacted steel.
There was a thunderclap and an insane shriek of tearing metal. A dazzling double fan of molten sparks sprayed half a thousand feet into the air. Amanda had expected the bow of the Shenandoah to lift as she drove up and over the Indonesian frigate, but it didn’t work that way. The Commando carrier displaced sixty-six thousand tons, the frigate less than two thousand. It was a rhinoceros running down a sheep.
There was a tooth-rattling shock, a long shudder, and the Shenandoah simply sailed through the smaller vessel, her underwater propeller guards shoving the two sundered halves of the frigate aside.
Looking to port, Amanda caught a momentary glimpse of the frigate’s stern section, as if she were seeing an engineering cutaway. The compartments and passageways were torn open but still internally illuminated. Maimed and struggling crewmen could be seen toppling into the sea.
Then the inrushing waters must have killed the power systems. All went dark and the Shenandoah was driving clear.
“All elements open fire!” Amanda yelled into her headset. “Commence! Commence! Commence!”
*
On the nameless channel island, Stone Quillain yelled into his lip mike. “Battery, fire the mission!”
“On the way!” the reply rang back.
Four 120mm mortar shells were released, each sliding down the throat of its tube to strike the firing pin at the bottom. Propulsive charges exploded and the shells screamed on their way, tracking on their high ballistic trajectories.
One of the strengths of the trench mortar is in its disproportionate firepower. As it is a low pressure, low velocity weapon, less of its throw weight needs to be put into its shell casing and more into the explosive charge it carries. Thus, a mortar shell can be more powerful than the equivalent round fired from a cannon or howitzer.
The shells being fired this night by the Sea Demon battery were British-made Merlin anti-tank rounds. Their infra-red precision guidance system took up a percentage of space within the shell casing – but, as they pitched over the peak of their arcs and homed on the exhaust stack glow of the missile boat Rencong, they still packed a hellish punch.
Yet another advantage of the mortar is that it can be fired with great rapidity. A good mortar crew can have three rounds in the air before the first round hits its target. And the Army mortar men of the Sea Demon force were excellent.
The missile boat Rencong, the betrayer of the Karel Satsuitubun and the Teluk Berau, dissolved.
*
On the other flank of the rebel transport group, a section of SPEED Cobras popped over their concealing ridgeline.
“Flanker birds, designate your targets!” Arkady spoke carefully into his helmet mike. “Call it as you lock!”
His was a precise exercise in ammunition management. He had eleven SPEED Cobras with twenty-two small Penguin antiship missiles to be distributed among eight potential targets. He must get maximum effect out of each and every round.
“Flanker Lead, I got locks on the column leader!”
“This is Flanker Wing! I’m on the column trailer – I say again, I’m on the column trailer!”
“Flanker birds, take your shots!”
Stumpy, deadly projectiles roared from the launch rails of the flanker killers, flames streaming from their solid fuel booster rockets.
The compact Penguin anti-ship missile was unique among the world’s arsenal of anti-ship weapons. Designed by the Norwegian Defense Research Institute, it had been built specifically for the unique needs of the Norwegian Navy. Designed for use along the jagged, fjord-wracked Scandinavian coast, the Penguin was short-ranged with a comparatively small 120-kilogram warhead.
But it was a nimble little monster, its large fan of guidance fins making it extremely maneuverable and difficult to evade. Its guidance package was one of a kind for a ship-killer. The Penguin was a passive infra-red homing missile. It gave no electronic warning of its coming; you learned of its presence only when it came screaming down upon you.
“Flanker flights hover down! Evade!”
The SPEED Cobra team sank back below the safety of the ridgeline. The Jeannie II held her exposed station.
“Vince!” It was Pink Pinkerton’s alarmed voice over the Talk-Between-Pilots. “Get your ass down here!”
“Just calling the shots, my man,” Arkady murmured. “Be down in a second.”
Flash! Flash! It was like low set lightning through the drizzle. Through his thermographic imaging system, Arkady saw the outline of the lead missile boat distort and blaze bright. Two solid hits and a heavy topside fire! Dead meat!
Flash! There was only one impact on the trailing gunboat. One of the Penguins had “gone stupid” and had missed. A seventy-five per cent hit ratio. Arkady scowled. This wasn’t good enough.
Something began to pulse and flare rhythmically at the bow of the damaged surviving flanker boat. Muzzle blasts. Off to Arkady’s right, explosions raked along the top of the ridge. The maimed Lurssen was lashing back wildly at its attackers. Ignoring the gunfire, Arkady deliberately aligned his sights on the survivor. He keyed the arming and aiming sequence on one of his Penguins, giving it a look at its target. As the odd man out in the strike, he’d reserved his brace of missiles as coup-de-grâce shots.
He got the Penguin’s lock up tone in his earphones and squeezed off the round, closing his eyes for a moment against the glare of the missile booster.
When he opened them again, it was to see a wave of tracer rounds and fire trails sweeping towards him.
*
